Category Archives: Rail/Road

Gxpress has planned its expansion in India and abroad; the company plans to add fuel to its growth in terms of technology, workforce and number of offices worldwide. To expand its wings, it plans to start an ecommerce express and open operational branches in 25+ cities in India by 2025 supporting all the business lines. It plans to expand its workforce to 200+ employees and onboard clientele to about 4000+ sellers in India. Taking further to its US expansion, it plans to open warehouses in all major cities across the US including NJ, Chicago, LA, Houston. It also plans to add nomination shipments and onboard 75+ nomination clients and increase operational capacity to 3M small parcel last mile delivery across the US. “The logistics Industry has been on the frontline since the beginning of the unprecedented crisis due to Covid-19 and lockdowns, ensuring that the supply chains remain intact. Due to the shortage of labour and the restrictions being imposed on the movement of goods and businesses, the supply has been disrupted in the past 6 months. Now, as the businesses started opening up, we have planned our expansion in terms of recruitments, enhancement of technology and start operational offices all across the country and in major cities of US. We will focus on delivering unmatched and exclusive services in the growth of their customers by devising new strategies in the coming days” said Praveen Vashistha, Founder & Director of Gxpress.

In a bid to ensure corruption free industry, CONCOR has partnered with APM Terminals Pipavav for a webinar focused on anti-corruption in logistics industry. Jakob Friis Sorensen, Managing Director, APM Terminals Pipavav said, “This is truly one of a kind initiative where government company has partnered with Public limited company for issues surrounding anti-corruption and other compliances. At APM Terminals Pipavav, an effective compliance programme is a precursor to sustainability as we believe that anti-corruption measures are required to establish global standards and procedures to reduce illegal, unethical and improper conduct to keep industry clean. Compliance is an integral part of our business operation in sync with our parent Maersk Group where compliance is embedded part of culture.” “We are grateful to CONCOR for inviting us for this webinar and allowing us to share our insights and practices,” he adds. Entire management of CONCOR and staff members attended the webinar. The vision of A.P Moller Maersk on anti-corruption and compliance practices was well fathomed by the CONCOR group. A.P Moller Maersk believes in the need for 100% compliance in order to maintain the standard of a global company.

Assam is all set to have country’s first international multi-modal hub, informs Chandra Mohan Patowary, Assam Industry and Commerce Minister. The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has agreed to fund the project at an estimated cost of around Rs 600 crore. “The Government of Assam is planning to develop Jogighopa, a small township near Brahmaputra river, as a logistics hub or trans-shipment point for cargo moving from Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland to Bangladesh,” the minister informs. In addition, the Munshiganj River Terminal in Bangladesh will be used as a customs station to handle third-party export and import cargo via Kolkata Port. “To bring about a significant reduction in logistics cost and faster delivery of Bangladesh export cargo, the Indian side has raised the point regarding permitting a third country export-import trade under the coastal shipping agreement and protocol on inland water transit and trade (PIWTT) by allowing trans-shipment through ports on the east coast of India. The Bangladesh government agreed to hold stakeholder consultations and revert on the matter,” Patowary said. “Increasing connectivity through air, water, rail, road offer a mutually beneficial opportunity for enhancing economic cooperation between Bangladesh and the Northeastern states of India and beyond. Standard operating procedures for the use of Chattagram and Mongla ports for movement of goods to and from India, particularly to and from the Northeast of India have recently been concluded and it is expected that it would create a win-win situation for both economies,” he adds.

Utilising its services to improve global logistics, NICDC Logistics Data Services-NLDS (formerly DMICDC Logistics Data Services, DLDS) has extended its services to Nepal and Bangladesh after the consent of Land Port Authority of India (LPAI) to install the RFID readers at Integrated Check Posts (ICPs) at India–Nepal and India–Bangladesh border. With this expansion, exporters and importers from Nepal and Bangladesh can track the movement of their containers through Logistics Databank Portal www.ldb.co.in and a mobile application named ‘NICDC-LDB’. The expansion includes ICPs, namely, Agartala-India-Bangladesh Border, Petrapole-India–Bangladesh border, Jogbani-India–Nepal border, Raxaul-India-Nepal Border With this coverage ICPs located at Agartala, Jogbani and Raxaul will help in road movement container tracking and Petrapole ICP will help in rail movement container tracking. Speaking on the development, K. Sanjay Murthy, IAS, CEO & MD, NICDC (National Industrial Corridor Development Corporation) and Chairman, NLDS says, “The new extension of services reiterates our vision and commitment of streamlining logistics across the country and the brand’s ambition to improve the EXIM trade, reduce the logistics cost and pave the way for India to become a logistics hub.” Ichiro Oshima, CEO, NLDS says, “Since its inception in Dec 2015, NLDS has played a vital role in enhancing the operations of Ports and Maritime Industry in India. While aiming at 100 per cent container volume tracking in India, this expansion will certainly mark a great milestone in bringing efficiency in logistics and supply chain industry.” Before NLDS came into existence, operators handled logistics independently through autonomous systems, which led to delays and inefficient tracking. Through its flagship product, LDB (Logistics Data Bank), NLDS streamlined container movement and today serves 25 port terminals while handling 96 per cent of the country’s …

The Ministry of Railways has approved Alstom-built 12000 HP electric locomotives and RDSO to run freight trains at a maximum speed of 120 kmph. Indian Railways had inducted the WAG 12B e-locos, which are the most powerful locomotives to run on Indian tracks, earlier in the year. These electric locos will allow faster and safer movement of heavier freight trains capable to haul ~6000 tonnes at a top speed of 120 kmph. Planned to be deployed for operations on major freight routes of Indian Railways including the Dedicated Freight Corridors (DFCs), they are expected to increase the average speed of freight trains in India by at least 20-25 kmph. Alain SPOHR, Managing Director, Alstom India & South Asia said, “The approval from RDSO is indeed a matter of pride for all of us at Alstom and a testimony of our technical expertise in partnership with the Indian Railways. In line with India’s push towards self-reliance, we have successfully leveraged our local engineering and manufacturing capabilities. Alstom is also committed to support IR in reducing its carbon footprint and adopt cleaner technologies in its quest to transform into the world’s largest Green Railway network. India is a priority for Alstom, and we are committed to work closely with the Indian Railways for all their future modernization endeavours.” “Equipped with Insulated Gate Bipolar Transistors (IGBT) based propulsion technology, it would lead to considerable savings in energy consumption due to use of regenerative braking. The technology is also helpful towards making the acceleration process more efficient by reducing the heat generation and traction noise. Additionally, this move will not only bring down operational costs, but also reduce the congestion faced by Indian Railways”, …

To prepare for the upcoming surge in sales and deliveries with its gamut of services, Pickrr has announced to offer customised solutions for the e-commerce players to help COVID-19 hit online sellers recover in the following months. The company could bring down the typical 20 per cent increase in delivering e-commerce orders during festive to mere 5 per cent through their courier selection and real-time on-ground feature. Diwali is one of the highly celebrated seasons in the e-commerce industries as customers look forward to the sales and offers it brings. The sales are high, and the delivery periods are often longer due to an upsurge in order volume. Rhitiman Majumder, Co-founder, Pickrr, suggests, “Our real time analytics and prediction system to pre-empt failures gives the best performance to sellers so that they can make the most out of this season. While the general time taken to deliver orders increases by as much as 20 per cent is high demand seasons, we have retracted this rise to a mere 5 per cent through our intelligent courier selection and real time on-ground feedback in the past five years and will continue to do so.” Pickrr has partnered with Delhivery, Ekart Logistics, Ecom Express, Dotzot, DTDC, XpressBees, FedEx and many more for its best-known delivery services. For this year, Pickrr has curated customized offers for Diwali festival to help include local brands and small sellers deliver products to their customers. Rhitiman added, “This year has been tough for huge market players and for the smaller ones, it has been even tougher. We hope to provide multiple logistics options to these sellers, so they have more options to fall back upon.” According to the …

Maintaining the negative outlook on domestic road transportation sector, ICRA says, “The restrictions on cross-border movement, shortage in availability of drivers and manpower due to large-scale migration and lack of availability of return load, significantly impacted the road logistics sector during the first quarter.” According to Shamsher Dewan, Vice President, ICRA Ratings, “The aggregate revenues of ICRA’s sample of logistics companies contracted sharply by 35 per cent during the quarter. The impact was more visible on players operating on an asset-heavy model, due to high fixed costs for owned assets, while asset-light players fared relatively better. This decline was also corroborated by the generation of E-way bills, which contracted by 49% during the quarter. In addition to the impact on the road logistics sector, the macroeconomic slowdown and lockdown also had a bearing on the rail and seaways freight traffic that primarily comprises of bulk commodities like coal, cement, iron ore and crude oil with volumes contracting by 21.3 per cent and 19.7 per cent Y-o-Y, respectively.” With the economy gradually opening up during unlock phases and industrial, manufacturing and construction activities resuming, freight activity too has also been gradually reviving. The latest E-way bill and Fastag data indicates that freight volumes have recovered sequentially and improved to 87 per cent of pre-COVID levels (for E-way bills) and 95 per cent of pre-COVID levels (for Fastag) by August 2020. This has potential to increase further going forward as the country gears up for the upcoming festive season.

Stressing on the impact of COVID-19 on cargo movement, Ravi Jakhar, Chief Strategy Officer, Allcargo Logistics, says, “Although the COVID-19 has disrupted the economy and affected the cargo movement during the lockdown phase, the overall impact of the pandemic situation on the logistics sector will only remain in the short-term. The sector has, in fact, shown tremendous resilience to weather the storm. As the economy is showing signs of revival and the manufacturing sectors are coming back to normal, the logistics sector should regain its pre-COVID momentum soon. Unorganised logistics players with limited ability to navigate through the crisis may however get impacted.”

Emphasising on working towards an atmanirbhar logistics vertical, Anamika Sinha, Chairperson, SCLA, says, “The EXIM interest of private sector and their respective futuristic disposition along with logistics streamlining will surely help achieve the bigger picture down to the level-zero in complete sync with the state and government agenda. In view of same, the Project NorthEast (NE) has been an endeavoured at SCLA and is progressive since last couple of months.” Jaideep Raha, President – NorthEast, SCLA and Webinar Session Moderator, emphasised the potential for new business opportunities in the NE which can boost the GDP growth and presented a detailed, insightful presentation on the resources and development in NER. He made a insisting and assuring request to the concerned ministries to provide for the necessary infrastructure and the logistics team united under SCLA would come forward to ensure successful implementation and would be pleased to contribute to NER business growth. The Guest of Honour for the event were H K Sharma, IAS, Secretary, Dept of Industries Government of Sikkim, Hage Tari, IAS, Secretary, Industrial Trade & Communication Skill Development & Entrepreneurship, Government of AR, K K Dwivedi, IAS, Secretary Industries, Government of Assam, N. Sivasailam, IAS, Immediate Past Spl Secretary Logistics, Patron, SCLA, Vandana Agarwal, IES, Sr. Economic Advisor, MoCA, Shashi Bhushan Shukla, IRS Member Traffic & Logistics, IWAI, Kabir Ahmed, President, BAFFA, Aparajita Banerjee, Advisory Board Member (EAST and NE India) ANZ India Business Chamber; all the eminent speakers of respective region talked about their region initiatives and new business opportunities. Dwivedi shared the initiatives by the government on building trilateral highways connecting India, Myanmar and Thailand and trade movement through waterways via Brahmaputra River from India to Chattogram …

In order to cater to the upcoming festive season demand, Gati-KWE has revamped its express distribution, warehousing, and supply chain management services. Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, the company expects robust 50 per cent growth in volumes during the October-December festive season. The company is actively building capacity, strengthening its supply chain and delivery capabilities to cater to the expected volume rush. “We are further augmenting our express logistics capacity by two-fold for the upcoming festive season. Our decision to expand resources and service bandwidth by hiring additional trucks is a consequence of our experience and understanding of the market underlined by our commitment to efficiently accommodate the increased and dynamic demands of our customers during this period. As we go about doubling our capabilities, we are also giving utmost attention to COVID-19 care and safety and ensuring 100% adherence to precautions for our staff members, operators, partners, and all other stakeholders working with us,” said Bala Aghoramurthy, Deputy Managing Director, Gati-KWE Ltd. The company is aggressively promoting various offers to drive sales. These intense efforts are expected to significantly drive logistics volumes and demand in the festive season. Additionally, the changes in buying patterns suggest that consumer sentiment in India is gradually improving. According to the recent Mintel research findings, almost 30% of Indian consumers surveyed, plan to spend more on clothes and accessories followed by other goods.